Tuesday, June 19, 2007

TB05, TB09, and Banned Practice

The Boy, once again, has screwed himself over by not thinking ahead nor taking us seriously. After I bitched about his “band practice” leaving beer cans strewn all over the garage a few weeks back, I told them not to bring more beer to the manor. The Boy, of course, claims to have not gotten the memo (TB05)… but then why would empties be turning up in the trash can instead of the garage floor?

So this brings us to Sunday afternoon. Mrs. Fetched wanted the cooler to carry ice down to her mom’s. I found it in the detached garage… with a bunch of empty beer cans, and an empty (but still smelly) bottle of Jagermeister.

“That’s it,” said Mrs. Fetched when she got a look (and whiff). “No more band practice.” As happens all too often, it was left to me to execute the decision, since she had to spend the evening and all night at the chicken houses (it was the night to catch them). I usually hate doing this, because she has changed her tune and left me looking stupid too often, but she wouldn’t be there to rescind the decision (and she’s gotten better about that lately anyway). Besides, I was the one complaining about the drinking… probably because they were hiding it from Mrs. Fetched a bit more.

So when I picked up The Boy from his counseling session (which isn’t doing him much good as far as I can tell), he said something about band practice and I said it was cancelled.

“Why?” he demanded. “I’m having band practice.”

“Too late,” I said. “I already called P.O.D. and told him it wasn’t happening.”

“You can’t do that! I want to know why!”

“Because I said no drinking during band practice, and you guys bring it anyway. We found the beer cans and Jagermeister in the cooler. Don’t you remember why you have that ankle bracelet?” (Probation violation via underage drinking, for those of you just now tuning in.)

“I only have one or two.” (He’s told Mrs. Fetched that he hasn’t been drinking at all.)

I just laughed. “You’re always talking about Jagermeister, and presto! Here’s an empty bottle.”

Pause for two seconds. “That doesn’t mean there was anything in it. What if I just had it to draw a copy of the logo?”

Again, I laughed. “You expect me to believe that?!”

“Well, we’re having band practice today. You can’t tell me I can’t.”

“Our house, our rules.”

“It’s my house too!”

“You don’t pay for it, you don’t clean up anything…”

“I don’t mess anything up!”

“Except for the beer cans you and your friends leave all over the place.” (Cigarette butts too, although they started throwing them in a can since we threatened to cut off band practice earlier. He’s already as much as confirmed that he’s going right back to the pot as soon as his probation is over — when he asked why I thought that, he was grinning; I mentioned that all his new t-shirts, his lyrics, his drawings, all of it is drug-related. He started trotting out the justifications, naturally. TB09, it shouldn’t be illegal anyway.)

So this dragged on into the evening, with me alternately trying to introduce him to the Real World and just not saying anything (usually when he was demanding or cursing). I was waiting for a TB04, but fortunately that never happened. At one point, he accused us of not doing anything for him; I replied, “We moved heaven and earth to keep you out of jail the second time. Well, your mom did; I was ready to just let you sit there.” He had very little to say after that — he’s always been under the impression that Mrs. Fetched was the hardcase here.

Around 9 p.m., he finally gave up, after slamming only one door. After he settled down, I let him use the computer since I was getting tired anyway. I’m sure he said bad things about us all over Myspace… but I really don’t care what he thinks. A TB01 is coming, the day after the ankle bracelet comes off, whether he wants to leave or not. Mrs. Fetched told him so.

Everytime I read one of these stories about how he ****'s all over you guys, really makes me mad. Why wait until his ankle braclet comes off?

It's time to break out the big guns.

Call his PO and tell him that the Boy is drinking and have his immature ass thrown back in jail. (I'm serious) When he gets out, put his stuff on the curb and be done with it. Until you guys play serious hard ball, he's going to keep coming back and doing his "thing".

Solar... we agreed to do our part, and we'll stick by it. I know he isn't holding up his side, but we'll keep our word as an example if nothing else. He's got less than two weeks to go, so we can put up with him for that long... then he's on his own. Mrs. Fetched has told him he's completely on his own the day after the ankle bracelet comes off.

Wow, TB sure is a piece of work again! (or is it still?) Seems to me that you and Mrs. Fetched have given him plenty of chances to turn things around and he just keeps pushing those buttons. Make sure you make the big "eject" button too tempting for him when the ankle bracelet comes off in a few weeks and let him send himself off in style.

Sounds like he needs a big dose of unmitigated hard reality, which you've tried to ease him into, but maybe now he needs it to bitch slap him but good (though you think he'd have figured that out by now!) You and the Mrs. sure are deserving of a respite, that's for sure!

When I hear stuff like this about people's kids, it just reinforces for me my snide attitude of "that's why we have dogs." No offense, but I am so glad our kids have four legs. :-)

Comments are welcome, and they don't have to be complimentary. I delete spam on sight, but that's pretty much it for moderation. Long off-topic rants or unconstructive flamage are also candidates for deletion but I haven’t seen any of that so far.

I have comment moderation on for posts over a week old, but that’s so I’ll see them.

About Me

I've been doing technical writing since 1982. In that time, I got married, raised two kids, and am now raising a grandkid. The latter, family, is what defines me. If my career were my life, many things would be different.

I've always wanted to write stories, but too often found myself doing other things. At some point in the last few years, I got serious about it. In that time, I've written two novels, started a third, and wrote numerous short stories and flash fiction pieces. Many of them can be found on my blog, and I'm in the final few laps of publishing one of my novels, White Pickups.

I'm not all that concerned about "getting published" as eBook outlets now make it possible to bypass the entire query/agent/publisher gauntlet. Yes, doing it yourself is a lot of work — but honestly, the traditional route requires much the same amount (and kinds) of work but without any guarantee of seeing your work on the shelves, actual or virtual. That's not to say I would turn down a traditional book deal if one were offered, but I'm not going to go begging either. In either case, I don't expect to quit my dayjob. It's more important to me that people read and enjoy my stories than having some commercial success.